North body contests contempt plea

The North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) on Friday challenged a plea for initiating contempt proceedings against it for not demolishing an illegal structure which has come up on Subhash Park near Jama Masjid, saying Delhi Police was to be blamed for it.

The North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) on Friday challenged a plea for initiating contempt proceedings against it for not demolishing an illegal structure which has come up on Subhash Park near Jama Masjid, saying Delhi Police was to be blamed for it.

“Why is the Delhi police dragging its feet? Let them give protection and let the court set a date and time. We need only two hours to demolish the structure,” NDMC’s counsel Chetan Sharma told a three-judge bench headed by acting chief justice A K Sikri.

The Delhi High Court on July 30, while directing the Archeological Survey of India and the NDMC to remove the structure, asked the police to provide protection to the demolition team.

The police had urged the court to modify its previous order to demolish the structure on the grounds of apprehension of breach of peace and communal harmony. It wanted that Matia Mahal MLA Shoaib Iqbal, who is believed to have erected the structure himself, should be asked to remove it under the aegis of the ASI.

The MLA, meanwhile, requested the court to allow people to offer Namaz at the disputed site till the pendency of the case. He referred to the Babri Masjid case and submitted that even the Supreme Court had permitted people to offer prayers in the makeshift temple of the disputed site in Ayodhya. The bench, however, said this is a different case and cannot be compared with the Ayodhya case.

The ASI said that IIT Kanpur has been asked to carry out a Ground Penetrating Radar Survey to ascertain the nature of structure which was under the ground.